Thread: Steven's Trilogy - Zero Equals Infinity

Originally Posted by stevenlchilds

Zero equals infinity.

Provide mathematical proof of your claim.

According to my physics professors, dividing by zero equals infinity. Now feel your brain explode as mine did.

It's really pretty obvious... if you have some non-zero number, how many times do you have to add zeroes together to reach it? Clearly an infinite number, as no matter how many zeroes you add you'll still have zero.

Technically infinity isn't actually a number though, it just represents a process.

'1 divided by 0 equals infinity' actually just means as you divide 1 by smaller and smaller positive numbers closer and closer to 0, the answer gets as big as you want. It doesn't mean '1 divided by the number 0 is the number infinity'. If that were the case you could ask 'why not minus infinity'?

Uh oh, I am going to have to argue with your professors. Dividing by zero does not result in infinity. Dividing by zero is impossible.

Mmm well it's well defined in various systems. Normally you actually define infinity as the 'rational' 1/0. As with all mathematics we do this because it is useful.